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Sunday, March 3, 2013

Is Obama's Upcoming Israel Visit as Fictitious as That of The Rolling Stones?

I. A whole lot of people hooked on Ziocaine got punked last week by a prank article published in The Jewish Press. The article touted an upcoming concert in Israel by The Rolling Stones:

Despite a barrage of attacks from British, European and U.S. Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) groups, the Rolling Stones will perform their planned concert in Jerusalem on Israel’s Independence Day, Monday, April 15.

“We’ve been slammed and smacked and twittered a lot by the anti-Israeli side,” said Mick Jagger, the band’s leader and most recognizable member since 1963. “All I can say is: anything worth doing is worth overdoing. So we decided to add a concert on Tuesday.”

Needless to say, tickets to both concerts, Monday night in Teddy Stadium in Jerusalem and Tuesday night in Bloomfield Stadium, Tel Aviv, have been sold out even as Jagger was speaking.

The hoax article went further into details of the fictitious concert series.

Unsurprisingly, some took the bait, in spite of a disclaimer ("This has been a Purim prank…"). My favorite:

Legendary rock band The Rolling Stones has announced it will not cancel its planned concert in Jerusalem, to be held on Israel’s Independence Day April 15, despite pressure from anti-Zionist groups. Instead, the band decided to add a second Jerusalem concert the next day.

Legendary rock band The Rolling Stones has announced it will not cancel its planned concert in Jerusalem, to be held on Israel’s Independence Day April 15, despite pressure from anti-Zionist groups. Instead, the band decided to add a second Jerusalem concert the next day.

“We’ve been slammed and smacked and twittered a lot by the anti-Israeli side. All I can say is: anything worth doing is worth overdoing. So we decided to add a concert on Tuesday,” said Mick Jagger, the band’s lead singer, according to the Jewish Press.

and my favorite, the amazing Pamela Geller (Rep. Bob Bring ME the Donkey Lynn's BFF), who was in ecstasy over this, in her original post that lauded the Stones' courage:

ROLLING STONES TELL JEW-HATERS TO KISS THEIR ....... ADDS ANOTHER DATE TO ISRAEL TOUR ON ISRAEL INDEPENDENCE DAY

and:

It is so delicious to see very cool people standing against savagery, thuggery and injustice. I'd wish I could get to Jerusalem just to see this show.

When Geller's being punked was exposed by commenters to her post, she lied and turned on them. According to Phan Nguyen:

Thus—essentially saying, “I was testing you”—Geller pretended to be in on the joke. However, there are several reasons why this is implausible:

1. Geller acknowledged that it was a Purim joke. But by the time of she had posted her story on February 26, Purim was already over. It would be like making an April Fool’s joke on April 2.

2. Geller didn’t quote directly from the original Jewish Press article but instead based her post on Robert Miller’s Joshuapundit article. To this day, Miller appears unaware that the story is a hoax and his post stands uncorrected. There is no indication that Geller had seen the original article in The Jewish Press before she posted.

3. Despite claiming that she was proving a clever point, Geller later removed the posting from her website and also deleted her tweet referencing it. What’s the point of making a point and then deleting all references to the point?

II. So The Rolling Stones aren't going to Israel in April, after all. How about Obama in March, especially if he doesn't have an Israeli Government with whom to meet?

President Barack Obama's historic first visit as US leader to Israel this month could be in jeopardy after Benjamin Netanyahu was forced to plead for extra time to cobble together a new coalition government.

The Israeli prime minister was granted a two-week extension by Shimon Peres, Israel's president, after missing Saturday's deadline to reach agreement with rival parties following January's inconclusive general election.

He now has until March 16 to form a government – otherwise Mr Peres will ask another party leader to lead coalition talks.

White House officials have said Mr Obama will call off his visit if no government is in place by then.

The US president is scheduled to arrive on March 20 for a two-day trip that will also include the West Bank city of Ramallah.

If you find Israeli party politics bewildering, you are not alone. I suppose Netanyahu himself is bewildered by the maze he helped build, and in which he is now all but trapped:

Netanyahu's Likud-Beitenu won 31 of the Knesset's 120 seats - an eroded lead that forced him to cast a wide net for partners while juggling their disparate demands.

During the 28-day period, Netanyahu managed to forge a pact only with the party of former foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, whose six-member faction "The Movement" has given him 37 seats, way short of the minimum 61 needed to confirm a new coalition.

In a brief statement following his meeting with Peres on Saturday night, Netanyahu hinted that at least one potential coalition partner refused to sit alongside others.

Netanyahu has faced demands from the parties that placed second and fourth, Yesh Atid (There is a Future) and Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home), to slash mass exemptions from military conscription and cut welfare stipends to ultra-Orthodox Jews.

In coalition talks on Friday with Bayit Yehudi, Netanyahu's chief negotiator said the right-wing party was unwilling to sit alongside ultra-Orthodox parties but Bayit Yehudi officials denied this.

At Mondoweiss, Annie Robbins has provided an excellent, detailed analysis of Netanyahu's pickle, which most likely adds up to no Israeli ruling coalition by the date set for Obama's trip. She observes that in spite of gains by moderate factions in the January election, the hardliners seem to hold the last trump. Playing it - accepting the notion of outright annexation of Palestine without giving the non-Jewish Palestinians any citizenship rights - will isolate Israel internationally, certainly from Europe and most of Latin America.

Pressures on the disagreeing parties to come up with something so as to avoid a cancellation or rescheduling of Obama's trip are probably there, but insignificant. One shouldn't forget that there is far more antipathy toward Obama in Israel than there is, even among white GOP conservatives and Tea Party fanatics, in the USA.